Defense lawyer: “I would put petrol on her and set her alight”

Mukesh Singh, the bus driver who admitted driving the bus during the incident, but denied taking part in the attack, was one of five men convicted of Jyoti’s rape and murder and sentenced to death by hanging.

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Speaking about the appalling attack, which he refers to as “an accident”, Mukesh Singh suggested the rape and beatings were to teach Jyoti and her friend a lesson that they should not have been out late at night. And he criticised Jyoti for having fought back against her attackers saying: “When being raped, she shouldn’t fight back. She should just be silent and allow the rape. Then they’d have dropped her off after ‘doing her’, and only hit the boy.”

He said that executing him and the other convicted rapists/murderers will endanger future rape victims: “The death penalty will make things even more dangerous for girls. Now when they rape, they won’t leave the girl like we did. They will kill her. Before, they would rape and say, ‘Leave her, she won’t tell anyone.’ Now when they rape, especially the criminal types, they will just kill the girl. Death.”

To me, that’s not the disgusting part. It should be, but I am hardened to sociopathic violent thugs blaming others for their crimes. So I am not disgusted.

What does disgust me? This, from this Indian death row inmate’s attorney:

In a previous televised interview, lawyer AP Singh said: “If my daughter or sister engaged in pre-marital activities and disgraced herself and allowed herself to lose face and character by doing such things, I would most certainly take this sort of sister or daughter to my farmhouse, and in front of my entire family, I would put petrol on her and set her alight.” And he confirms to Udwin in the documentary that his stance remains the same: “This is my stand. I still today stand on that reply.”

I don’t know what offends me more: that an attorney would so depravedly risk his death row client’s case by endorsing his client’s capital offense, or that an attorney would so brag that he would defy Indian law and commit homicide by burning his sister to death. In Maryland, you can face attorney discipline merely for calling your client vulgar insults, but I guess in India bragging about one’s intent to burn a female relative to death during a death row appeal is not a professional responsibility concern.